This may come as a blow, but in home design and, actually, in life, passion isn’t enough.

Passion is to design what desire is to success — a good start. And that’s all.

I don’t mean to judge, but the truth is some people express their passions with such unbridled — and OK, tasteless — abandon that their homes look like a cross between a mental illness and a flea market.

I’d like to change that.

Last week I sought out people who’ve successfully turned their passions into artful home decor. They are, sadly, the exceptions.

“A collection isn’t art,” says Los Angeles-based designer Sarah Barnard. “To graduate to art, a collection needs to be put in a new context in a way that creates an impact.”

The following people get that.

Gone marbles

If you’ve lost your marbles, Cathy Svacini of Kansas City, Mo., probably has found them. She and her husband, who met at a marble collectors’ convention 25 years ago, have created a home that reflects their passion. It has marbles in the gravel driveway, marble cabinet knobs, a mailbox perched on bowling-ball-sized marbles, and a room dedicated to marbles with a shooting table.

“I grew up with four brothers and liked to shoot marbles because girls can play just as well as boys,” says Svacini, who started her marble collection at age 8. “I fell in love with how beautiful they are, and with their stories.”

Since then, she and her husband have amassed what is considered the nation’s largest, most complete marbles collection, currently on loan to the Kansas City Toy and Miniature Museum.

Shrunken heads

When Renee Young of New Rochelle, N.Y., saw her first lady-head vase at a flea market in 1997, she stared at it for 10 minutes.

“I had never seen anything so lovely,” says the public relations professional, who now has about 70 head vases on dedicated shelves flanking her fireplace. “They have exquisite details — earrings, hats, pearl necklaces — and a hole at the top for flowers.”

In the 1950s, florists gave these vases away with flowers. Now she finds them at flea markets, estate sales, antique stores and on eBay.

“My ex-husband says he got out just in time, before I could add him to my collection.”

Play ball

When Karim Basta was 7, he walked through the tunnel at Boston’s Fenway Park and first set eyes on the Red Sox ball field. The former Little Leaguer and current securities analyst from New Canaan, Conn., caught Red Sox fever that has dropped a degree in all these years.

Two years ago, after he read an article in The Boston Globe about an artist who specialized in Red Sox murals, he looked at his unfinished basement and an idea hit like a pop fly.

Enter M-C Lamarre, a meticulous mural artist from New Bedford, Mass. In the past two years, Lamarre has completed more than 60 Fenway Park-inspired commissions in 13 states, where she’s painted the iconic Green Monster, the nickname for the huge outfield wall that defines left field, on bedrooms, dens and sides of barns — and in Basta’s basement, a floor-to-ceiling Fenway replica. Basta’s three kids think the space, which houses air-hockey, ping-pong and foosball tables, is a home run. His wife, well, she’s been a great sport about it.

Vintage to the core

The difference between art and garbage is often presentation. Most people would look at an old apple crate and toss it. Some might stack the crates in a corner and create an eyesore. Colleen Allison, however, takes the labels from vintage apple crates, mounts them with uniform frames and mattes, and displays them in her Avondale, Pa., home.

She’s painted her walls in colors that enhance the art: sea-grass green and Mandarin orange.

“I just love them,” she says. “They are colorful and keep my husband in touch with his roots.”

The labels, like her husband, hail from Yakima, Wash., the nation’s apple capital, which she prefers to Avondale’s claim to fame, the less attractive mushroom.

Now, as a personal favor, if you know someone who has a collection that hasn’t graduated to art, please hand him or her a copy of this column.

And then join me next week for more examples and tips on how to turn your passion into a good look.

Marni Jameson is the author of “House of Havoc” and “The House Always Wins” (Da Capo Press). Contact her through www.marnijameson.com.

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